Dead Last (Vol. 1): Dead Last

by Quaranta, Marc

  "We have no choice. And it's not like we're going to be overrun by outside people. We'll have...three people go, grab supplies, and come back. It's either that or we all starve to death. There are kids in here, you guys."

  "There's a meal option," again from Jack.

  I shot him the worst look I could work up at the time and continued on with the others, "Look. The news said that the risk for infection rises when you come in contact with something outside or you breath in the particles...there's got to be something we can do."

  "I've got gloves and protective masks that the cleaning staff uses," Scott was walking down the hall before he was done talking.

  Nick and I followed him pretty close behind as we headed for the janitorial closet. The rest of the group tagged along a couple paces back and far behind them, Jack took his sweet time catching up. He walked with his arms crossed and his jaw moved like he was slowly chewing gum. Such an ass.

  Scott dug around inside the closet at the end of the hall. There were mops, cleaning supplies, a cart to push around, extra trash bags, paper towels and toilet tissue, but no masks or gloves. He pushed a couple things out of the way. Nick had to catch a couple things from falling off the shelf so that it wouldn't hit me.

  "Here," Scott said as he pulled two boxes off the shelves. He handed me the gloves and ripped open the other.

  I looked inside and counted the gloves. My God, there weren't too many. I glanced up at Nick who was obviously feeling the same way that I was when he saw the lack of latex in the box.

  "Eleven," I said when I finished counting.

  "Eleven pairs?" asked Joe.

  "No. Eleven gloves. Five pairs and an extra."

  "There are only seven masks," Scott handed Nick the box in disappointment.

  "Ha! So even if we wanted to make an escape for it, half of us would die at the end of the parking lot," Jack retorted.

  "Once they're used, we can't reuse them. Don't you think?" Nick's eyes bounced around his head with thought.

  "Right."

  "So, who is going to go?" Heather asked. It'd been a while since I noticed she was in the room.

  "I'll go," Nick spoke up with no hesitation. I could tell he wasn't only gaining my respect, but the other people in the room were beginning to look up to him.

  I reached up and touched him on the arm. He was being so strong, but I think I could sense some fear behind his eyes. Nobody would blame him if he was scared. He smiled at me and then looked away like he was trying to fight back some tears. He looked back at me, though, stone faced and then looked at everyone else to see who else would volunteer.

  "I'll go with him," said one of the people I never expected to hear from. Travis had his hand raised like some awkward turtle. His fingertips didn't go above his head and he quickly dropped his hand when he felt weird. "I'll go."

  "What?" Jenny pulled him by the arm and they had a private conversation, even though everyone, myself included, could hear every word. "What are you doing? You can't go out there."

  "Nobody takes me seriously, Jenny. I want to help out," he said it with the saddest dough eyes I'd ever seen. If I was Jenny, there would be no way I could say no to him.

  "Okay," I guess she felt the same way I did because she understood him. "Then go help."

  She rubbed his arm, too. It must be the thing to do when a guy offers to sacrifice himself for the good of the group. Instantly, I could see tears running down Jenny's face. It wasn't a loud wheezing cry, but there were plenty of tears.

  "I say...one more," I said. Three people was the perfect number. We'd still have four masks left, five gloves left, and three people could carry a lot of supplies back.

  For some reason, everyone looked at the pediatrician's husband, Sam. He had proven himself to be a tough guy during the verbal arguments and I think everyone assumed he would be strong willed enough to go out with Jack and Travis. At first, he brushed off their eye contact by looking away, but it didn't work. People continued to glance at him and throw his name, silently, into the hat.

  "I'm sorry. I can't. I can't leave my family," Sam said.

  "I'll go," after Travis, Heater was the last person I thought would volunteer. At this rate, 64-year-old, deaf Barry was going to volunteer. I immediately felt bad for thinking that.

  "No," I said immediately.

  "Why Not?" she asked. "You don't trust me?"

  "It's not that," I said. But it was that. Of course, I don't trust you. She would probably get out, steal a truck, and go find Kurt. I didn't trust her at all.

  "No, we're going to do this Titanic style," Travis said. Nobody knew what the hell he was talking about, "Ya know, women and children into the boat first and men stay on the ship...except...except it is like the opposite here. Woman and children stay on the ship, which is the station, and the men go into the water cause it's polluted."

  Jenny pulled Travis in closer to her body. It made sense what he was saying, but it was a dumb comparison. I knew it and I think Jenny did, too. She pulled him in so he'd stop talking. Some of us in the group had a quick laugh under our breaths. As bad as things got, it was always good to see some smiling faces.

  "What about you, Jack?" I said loudly.

  "Risk my life to bring you people food? No thanks," he said.

  "You're going to need food, too."

  "I'll manage a lot longer without it than most of you."

  "I have to make sure the building continues to run. A lot of things could go wrong," Scott said. I agreed with him and nodded towards him. Anyone could go and grab supplies, but only Scott knew how to operate the building.

  "I'll go with them. It could be exciting," Dan said from the back of the group. He stood next to Jack.

  With Scott and Sam, and even myself, in the group, the two-people joining Nick on this trip were Travis, who was awkward and unintelligent, and Dan, who would probably lose in a fight against a cat. I didn't feel too confident in this mission anymore.

  "Oh, fuck it," Jack said. I guess he didn't feel too confident, either. He volunteered to go. "I'm sure you'd bring back a box of vegetarian meals," he said to Dan.

  "What's wrong with that?" Dan asked.

  IV

  Jack Scoville

  A few minutes later, I was putting a pair of gloves on with Nick and Travis. These weren't exactly the two people I wanted to be taking this trip with, but I guess they were as good as any option I was gonna get. I actually would have felt more comfortable if Sam were coming with. He was kind of an ass, but he had his head on right. But like I said earlier, he had a wife and a daughter. Life wasn't about him anymore. He had to make sure his family was safe. He didn't have a life of his own anymore.

  We stood in between door one and door two, in that small four by four room, putting on our gloves and masks. Nick seemed calm, almost as calm as I did, but Travis was getting on my nerves very quickly. As the two of them were getting ready for this, Travis wouldn't stop talking. His shaky nerves worked their way to his jaw and it wouldn't stop moving. At least at this point, his mouth stopped running, but he was hopping up and down like a boxer before a fight, except it was Travis so it was more like a rabbit hopping.

  "You ready?" Nick asked.

  I nodded and waited for him to open the door. He took a deep breath and blew it out. Still, I waited for him to open the door. He took another deep breath and blew it out. I looked back at Travis, who was still hopping, and he was in a world of his own. He wasn't paying attention to us. He stared at the ceiling and hopped. Nick had his hand on the door, but wouldn't pull it open. He stared with wide eyes.

  "Hey, if I'm going to die, let's not be all day about it," I said.

  "Do you want to go first?" Nick asked me.

  It was a fair question, and I felt like being honest, "No, I don't."

  "Then shut up. Okay, here we--Travis, for the love of God man, would you fucking stop?"

  Travis stopped jumping and for a brief moment I kind of liked him. We connected eyes and actually shared a
quick laugh. Very quick. It probably wasn't going to happen again.

  Nick took another deep breath and finally pulled the door open. We slowly stepped outside and waited for something to happen. The air smelled normal. It felt normal. Everything seemed fine. I felt fine.

  The station had a lot of open light in it. The entire north wall was dominated by glass, but stepping out into the direct light blinded me. I could barely see Nick, who was covering his eyes. After a moment, my eyes adjusted.

  Travis' must not have adjusted as easily. He bumped into me but said he was sorry. The three of us looked around the parking lot. There were about seven or eight cars in the front parking lot. I looked at mine, and for a moment, thought about hopping in it and driving away, but for some reason decided against it. I think I was just hungry enough to go on this stupid mission.

  "The van should be over there," Nick pointed and started walking.

  I guess we were going to take one of the reporters’ vans. It had a lot of room so we could pack more supplies. Nick led the way and Travis walked behind me. I looked back a couple times to make sure he hadn't fallen down dead.

  We were all breathing pretty quickly. Each of us agreed to take short, quick breaths so that if something did get through our masks, we would blow it out just as quickly. We came to the van and I walked straight to the driver seat, "I'm driving."

  Nick looked at me awkwardly, but tossed me the keys right away. He didn't want any part of this. Travis assumed his position and got into the back seat of the van and Nick hopped in the passenger seat. Nick, I don’t know why, pointed to the ignition like I didn’t know where to put the key. I think he was nervous. I was a little nervous, but I had my shit together. I glanced in the mirror at Travis, who definitely didn’t have his shit together.

  “You alright, Travis?” I asked him.

  “Yea, let’s just do this and get back,” Travis started to fiddle with his mask.

  “Keep that on. This car is no safer than being out there. Keep everything on,” I said to him and he nodded nervously.

  “Where should we go?” Nick asked.

  It hit me at that moment that we never talked about that. Everyone was so intent on pushing us out the door into the polluted air, but we never once talked about where we were going to drive to gather supplies. I wasn’t from around here so I had no damn idea where to go.

  “What’s close by? I’m not driving twenty fucking miles,” I expressed.

  “Well the closest thing is a gas station, but maybe we should get to a Kroger or Marsh,” Nick said.

  “No. Gas station will do fine. Which direction?”

  “There’s not going to be many nutritional choices,” Travis spoke from the back. I really think he pulled an Elvis and left the building. He was talking, but by looking into his eyes, I could tell he wasn't all there.

  “Does it look like I give a rat’s ass about nutrition? I think there are bigger problems than getting the proper Vitamin C,” I told him.

  “Just go that way,” Nick pointed to the north west.

  I started the car, by putting the key in the spot Nick pointed to earlier, and headed out of the parking lot. We had just turned onto the main road leading out of the station when I already spotted the BP sign peeking out over the trees. This time Nick didn’t point like an idiot.

  “See it?” he asked me.

  “Yea, I see it.”

  “Where?” Travis asked. He ducked between the two front seats like an excited kid and scanned the road for it.

  “It’s over the trees. You can’t see it anymore,” Nick said to him.

  “Damn.”

  Three minutes in the car with Travis and I couldn’t take it anymore. He really was like a big, dumb kid. It was like he had too much sugar every morning. I’m sure he did. He was the 4 a.m. anchor and probably sucked back three or four cups of coffee in order to be wide awake that early. I hope that he doesn’t plan on sticking with that routine now that there isn’t gonna be any more news shows.

  “Stop the car,” Nick said.

  “What? Why?” I asked.

  “Stop the car, Jack.”

  I stopped the car in the middle of the road and looked at Nick waiting for an explanation, but he just stared out the window. He looked like a dog staring at its master waiting for the ball to be thrown. His mouth hung open and his eyes were wide.

  “What the hell is it?”

  “Look,” he pointed out down the road.

  There was a person walking. He was moving really slow. He could only pick his feet up for so long with each step before digging them into the pavement. His shoulders were slouched and his head looking down. It looked like he had been walking for days, like he was caught in the middle of the desert with no water and no food. He was sick. He had to be sick. He wasn’t wearing a mask, or anything to cover his face, and he had a nasty gash on the side of his face. I couldn’t tell by the looks of it what caused the cut, but it was bleeding down his face and onto his shoulder.

  “What do we do?” Travis asked. His expression was no different than Nick’s.

  “What do you mean? We keep driving,” I said.

  “Keep driving? We can’t just leave him.”

  “No, we have to,” Nick had my back.

  “Who knows what the air has done to him.”

  After I said those words, the guy dropped to his knees in mid step and almost fell on his face if he hadn’t braced his fall by slamming his hand down on the pavement. After only a second or two, his arm gave out and his shoulder slammed into the ground. He rolled over onto his back, but that was the last time we saw him move.

  “Jesus Christ. How long you think he’s been walking?” Nick asked me.

  “I don’t know. That cut didn’t look more than a couple hours old.”

  “Alright, quick drive by.”

  I stepped onto the gas and got the car up to a pretty quick speed right away. I didn’t want to take any chances of catching whatever that guy got even with the gloves and the mask on. We drove by him and all of us looked his way. He was dead, alright. Motionless. Blood running from the cut on his face and puddling out onto the pavement. His eyes were still open and it was almost like he was staring at us.

  “Look out!” Nick screamed to me.

  It was too late. I hit her. I hit a girl that was running across the street trying to get our attention. The thud her body made when she hit the car, you’d think we hit a deer. She rolled over the hood and onto the windshield before flying off to the side and landing behind us smacking into the pavement of the road. I slammed on the breaks and couldn’t move. I shut my eyes tightly and tried to forget what just happened. Erase it from my memory, but I couldn’t. It would take years, if ever, to forget that. I opened my eyes and could only see the smears of blood across the windshield. The glass wasn’t cracked, only stained.

  I turned my head as slow as it could possibly move to look at Nick. He was as motionless as the guy on the side of the road. His elbows were locked and his hands on the dashboard bracing himself. Travis had his hands covering his mouth like he was holding in a loud, girl-like shriek.

  “What the hell was that?” Travis asked.

  “What the hell do you think that was!” I turned around and screamed at him. He pushed his back into his seat.

  “I’m sorry!” Travis shouted back apologetic.

  I looked forward again at the blood that already looked to be drying on the windshield.

  “That was a girl, right?” Travis whispered to Nick.

  “Yes, that was a fucking girl! Are you a damn moron?!” I turned and almost hit him upside the head.

  “Should we check her?” Nick asked.

  I calmed down for a moment to collect my thoughts. I just kept picturing Travis’ dumb face and wanted to punch him in the mouth. What an idiot.

  “Jack, should we?” he repeated.

  “I don’t know,” I turned around in my seat to check on her. I could only see her leg…her leg that looked to be twisted
in a direction that legs shouldn’t turn. “Come on.”

  I kicked the door open and stepped outside. Normally, I wouldn’t risk stepping out into the open air, but I had to. I had to make sure she was okay…and by okay, I mean dead. If she was still alive, I think a part of me would die. If she was suffering after a hit like that, I don’t know that I would be able to walk away. But that would mean...if she was dead...I killed her.

  The air would have killed her eventually, I kept thinking to myself.

  Nick got out of the car and walked around to the front to see the damage. He didn’t say anything about it and I didn’t ask. It wasn’t my car and as long as it ran, I didn’t care what the front end looked like.

  “Oh, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck,” I stammered.

  “What?” Nick rushed to my side.

  She was still moving. She reached her arm out, not towards us but to the guy that had fallen down some ways back. I couldn’t believe it. I slammed my palm onto my forehead and bit my lip. I turned away immediately and walked in circles. It took everything inside of me to hold back from throwing up on the side of the road.

  After Travis saw Nick’s reaction, he decided to sit in the van. I saw him put shut his eyes and put his head between his legs to drown out any sound. I looked back at the girl and she was trying to drag her body across the road, but she stopped. There was blood everywhere. Her legs were badly broken and scraped. Her shoulder was far out of its socket and blood poured from her mouth like she was holding in a swig of red Kool-Aid.

  “Let’s go,” I said. I had to look away again. Something didn’t feel right in my stomach.

  “What? Man…look at her.”

  “There’s nothing we can do, Nick. She’s dead. Come on. The longer we stay out here the greater the risk. We have to go. Now!”

  We hopped back into the car and drove away. For the rest of the drive, we didn’t say a single word. We pulled up to the gas station and sat in the car. I couldn’t feel my legs. I felt like I just took a muscle relaxer and it only worked on my lower body. My legs felt heavy and like I had no control over them.